Stress gathered from the daily routine could affect your long term mental health, according to a recent study. From bickering with your partner to the traffic jam on your commute, researchers believe that these small stresses could take a heavy toll on your mental health. So how does one navigate such stress? A long term US study measured what people determined as their daily trigger for stress, be it their routine or relationships, as well as how they responded to them emotionally.
A negative mood and the emotions connected to it were monitored at the beginning of the study, as well as the disorders connected to it such as depression and anxiety. The emotional response to such stresses predicted whether or not people had mental health conditions, but they did not show whether they had a diagnosis based on the symptoms commonly linked to such conditions. While the responses to daily stresses didn’t necessarily predict the outcome of mental health diagnoses ten years on from the initial study, it did predict a self-reported diagnosis or experience of such disorders.
The researchers found that the daily stress triggers tend to cause damage over a period of time to our emotional wellbeing. This, they state, is consistent with the theories that suggest the manner in which we experience negative emotions and how we respond to them could have a negative effect on our mental health in the future. In order to improve your emotional health, it’s important to reduce your stress and take a calmer approach to your daily routine. Exercise can help to lower stress and increase endorphins in the body, as can a balanced diet – the heath issues connected with a poor diet put physical stress on your body, which can lead to a damaging effect on your emotional wellbeing.
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